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NEWSPAPERS 


AM) 


NEWSPAPER     WRITERS 


IN   NEW   ENGLAND. 


1787-1815. 


NEWSPAPERS 


AND 


NEWSPAPER    WRITERS 


IN   NEW   ENGLAND. 


1787-1815. 


READ  BEFORE  THE  NEW  ENGLAND   HISTORIC,   GENEALOGICAL 
SOCIETY,  FEB.  4,  1880. 


BY 
DELANO   A.  GODDARD. 


BOSTON : 
A.  WILLIAMS  &   CO., 

283  WASHINGTON  STREET. 
l880. 


UNIVERSITY  PRESS  : 
JOHN  WILSON  AND  SON,  CAMBRIDGE. 


NEWSPAPERS  AND  NEWSPAPER-WRITERS 


IN 


NEW  ENGLAND. 


ON  the  morning  of  the  4th  March,  1801,  the  "  Colum- 
bian Centinel,"  then  enjoying  a  pleasant  distinction  as 
"  our  leading  journal,"  printed  a  stately  epitaph  on  the 
death  of  the  Federal  Administration. 

YESTERDAY  EXPIRED, 

deeply  regretted  by  MILLIONS  of  grateful  Americans, 

And  by  all  GOOD  MEN, 
The  FEDERAL  ADMINISTRATION 

of  the 
GOVERNMENT  of  the  United  States 

Animated  by 

a  WASHINGTON,  an  ADAMS, —a  HAMILTON,  KNOX, 
PICKERING,  WOLCOTT,  MCHENRY,  MARSHALL, 
STODDERT,  and  DEXTER, 
Mi.  12  years. 

Then  followed,  with  similar  ingenious  display,  a  state- 
ment of  the  virtues,  achievements,  and  unexampled  trophies 
of  the  departed,  set  off  by  parallel  passages  of  indignant 
judgment  for  the  multitude  who  were  at  that  moment  exult- 
ing over  its  departure.  Thomas  Jefferson  became  President 
that  day,  and  the  great  party  which  had  given  the  nation 
a  Constitution,  and  had  nurtured  it  during  its  "  mighty 


youth,"  now  divided  against  itself  and   rejected   by  the 
people,  went  into  an  early  and  most  unhappy  decline. 

There  is  nothing  more  depressing  —  one  might  almost 
say  nothing  more  tragic  —  in  political  history  than  the 
story  of  the  rise  and  fall  of  the  Federalist  party,  as  it  ap- 
pears in  the  newspapers  from  1787  to  1815.  Pure  in  its 
origin  and  motive,  elevated,  patriotic,  honorable  in  all  its 
purposes,  with  the  name  of  Washington  and  his  immortal 
example  as  its  guide  and  beacon,  sustained  by  the  wealth, 
education,  and  social  influence  of  the  time,  —  men  of  books 
and  men  of  affairs  together  sharing  its  counsels,  —  it  nev- 
ertheless lost  its  hold  upon  public  confidence  almost  at  the 
moment  of  obtaining  it,  and  ceased  to  exist  while  its  prin- 
ciples were  still  full  of  life  and  power. ' 

The  event  for  which  the  "Centinel"  had  clothed  itself 
in  sables  marked  the  turning-point  of  the  first  political 
epoch  under  the  Constitution.  It  was  long  doubtful 
whether  Massachusetts  would  sustain  the  Constitution  or 
not.  The  majority  of  the  towns  in  Rhode  Island  rejected 
it  with  every  mark  of  contempt  and  discredit.  In  New 
Hampshire  there  was  a  powerful  minority  against  it ;  as 
there  was  also  in  both  the  Carolinas.  Virginia,  though 
consenting  at  last,  did  so  against  the  wishes  of  a  large 
part  of  her  people.  Patrick  Henry  was  a  host  against  it, 
and  many  of  the  large  planters  were  with  him.  The  set- 
tlements in  the  backwoods  and  mountains  were  solid  against 
it.  New  York,  under  the  sway  of  George  Clinton,  offered 
a  stalwart  opposition.  Pennsylvania,  as  in  many  a  later 
struggle,  stood  loyally  with  Massachusetts.  In  this  con- 
test, and  in  the  election  of  the  first  Congress  that  followed 
it,  the  two  parties  took  their  places,  and  established  their 
character  as  history  and  tradition  represent  them.  The 
Federalists,  under  the  lead  of  Washington,  Hamilton,  Mar- 
shall, and  Jay,  and  for  a  time  of  Madison  and  the  elder 


Adams,  were  in  search  of  a  safe,  strong,  and  independent 
government.  The  energy  and  masterly  power  with  which 
they  asserted  and  expounded  the  principles  of  the  Consti- 
tution earned  for  them  the  gratitude  of  all  later  genera- 
tions. The  anti-federalists,  encouraged  by  a  deep  popular 
distrust  of  central  power,  arid  stimulated  by  adroit  leaders 
whom  it  is  no  longer  the  fashion  to  call  by  their  right 
names,  resisted  with  pertinacious  zeal  to  the  last. 

The  newspapers,  —  crude,  impulsive,  discourteous  to  one 
another,  and  in  great  part  badly  written,  —  took  sides  for  and 
against  the  Constitution,  dropping  all  other  issues.  There 
were  among  them  no  trained  journalists  in  the  modern  sense, 
and  very  few  bold  and  strong  intellects  capable  of  dealing 
adequately  with  the  large  issues  precipitated  upon  the 
young  republic.  Fenno's  "  Gazette,"  Bache's  "  Aurora," 
and  a  little  later  Philip  Freneau's  and  Peter  Porcupine's 
"  Gazettes,"  were  the  best  the  seat  of  government  had  to 
offer,  —  and  they  were  all  bad  enough.  The  Federalist 
journals,  with  their  headlong  and  abusive  spirit,  bound  up 
with  their  own  petty  interests,  often  magnifying  the  less  at 
the  expense.of  the  greater,  fighting  over  trifles  and  with  one 
another  while  the  citadel  itself  was  in  danger,  were  often 
the  despair  of  the  wise  and  prudent  men  who  had  the  pub- 
lic destinies  in  their  charge.  The  anti-federalist  journals, 
equally  infirm  of  temper,  drew  together,  as  their  party 
became  crystallized,  a  group  of  able  outside  writers,  who, 
having  done  everything  in  their  power  to  kill  the  Consti- 
tution at  its  birth,  now  with  impertinent  presumption 
assumed  to  be  its  god-fathers,  and  filled  the  country,  then 
and  afterwards,  with  idle  tales  of  treason  and  conspiracy 
on  the  part  of  its  real  authors  and  most  loyal  defenders. 

The  current  affairs  of  the  world  were  at  that  time  ex- 
ceptionally turbulent.  Our  new  institutions  were  shaken 
by  the  passions  of  the  Old  World  to  a  degree  that  now 


6 


seems  incredible.  In  spite  of  their  recent  great  experi- 
ence, the  people  were  far  from  self-reliant.  Though  nom- 
inally and  actually  free,  the  habit  of  dependence  was  not 
easily  outgrown.  Large  classes  of  them  lost  their  heads 
upon  slight  provocation.  If  they  had  been  in  the  Paris 
barricades,  they  could  not  have  been  more  unreasonable 
than  they  were  over  the  insanities  of  the  French  Revolu- 
tion. Some  of  them  hated  it  with  mortal  hatred :  it  was 
saluted  by  others  as  the  final  deliverance  of  liberty.  The 
war  between  France  and  England  created  new  complica- 
tions. The  French  faction  was  stricken  with  "  statute 
madness."  Citizen  Genet,  a  bouncing  Frenchman,  full  of 
conceit  arid  absurdities  of  every  kind,  ran  up  and  down 
the  country,  drunk  with  the  adulation  of  multitudes  of 
excited  people,  defying  the  Government,  and  doing  his  lit- 
tle utmost  to  precipitate  another  war  with  Great  Britain. 
Tom  Paine,  base  and  insolent,  his  bad  natural  passions  and 
"  distorted  imaginations  inflamed  by  habitual  drunken- 
ness," was  conspicuous  among  the  defamers  of  Washington, 
and  among  those  most  active  in  stirring  up  sedition  among 
the  people.  It  was  Jefferson's  invitation  to  Paine  to  re- 
visit this  country  as  the  guest  of  the  nation,  while  his 
scurrillous  libels  on  the  character  of  Washington  and  his 
scoffing  assaults  on  the  religious  faith  of  the  people  were 
still  freshly  remembered,  that  deepened  the  disgust  and 
quickened  the  wrath  with  which  the  Federalists  regarded 
Jefferson's  advent  to  power.  Here  in  New  England  the 
French  frenzy  long  raged  without  check.  The  extreme 
anti-federalists  had  civic  feasts,  processions,  and  nightly 
carousals  in  honor  of  every  fresh  excess  of  the  Revolution. 
Nothing  more  absurd,  nothing  more  foreign  to  all  our 
Puritan  traditions,  or  more  deserving  to  be  blotted  out 
and  forgotten,  ever  transpired  on  our  soil.  The  adjust- 
ment of  our  commercial  relations  with  England,  under 


Jay's  treaty,  excited  them  to  fresh  outrages.  There  has 
been  no  folly  of  a  political  nature  to  compare  with  it  since 
that  time. 

To  the  Federalists,  on  the  other  hand,  the  French  Revo- 
lution was  odious.  The  varying  phases  of  French  power 
following  in  quick  succession  were  equally  odious.  It 
made  no  difference  to  them  whether  Danton,  or  Robes- 
pierre, or  the  First  Consul  were  at  the  fore,  —  in  their 
eyes  the  result  was  equally  an  insult  to  the  name  of  Lib- 
erty, and  a  flaunting  outrage  upon  human  nature.  Still 
later,  they  looked  upon  the  military  progress  of  Bonaparte 
over  the  Eastern  world  as  an  unmitigated  calamity ;  and 
in  spite  of  the  slights  and  injuries  Great  Britain  had  in- 
flicted upon  this  country,  their  sympathies  returned  to  her 
when  she  in  her  turn  was  threatened  by  this  military 
monster,  who  recognized  no  law  but  his  own  will  and  no 
reason  but  his  ambition.  Time  has  vindicated  the  justice 
of  the  Federalist  position  in  regard  to  Napoleon.  It  seems 
incredible  that  the  United  States  should  ever  have  drifted 
into  an  alliance  with  him,  or  ever  have  regarded  such  an 
egotist  as  a  fit  minister  of  any  cause  with  which  its  in- 
terests and  welfare  were  concerned. 

Domestic  questions  were  at  the  same  time  exciting  more 
intense  and  absorbing  interest.  The  funding  system,  the 
alien  and  sedition  laws,  the  Resolutions  of  '98,  the  embargo, 
the  non-intercourse  Acts,  followed  one  another  with  great 
rapidity,  and,  with  the  frequent  elections  and  the  per- 
petual jealousies  of  the  leaders  with  each  other,  kept  the 
political  current  seething  during  the  best  part  of  that  first 
generation.  For  many  reasons  the  excitement  in  New 
England  was  at  once  most  concentrated  and  most  univer- 
sal. There  were  here  a  greater  number  of  active  and  able 
men  who  took  a  deep  interest  in  public  affairs,  and  the 
newspapers,  such  as  they  were,  were  more  widely  read 


8 


than  were  those  in  the  rest  of  the  country,  excepting 
possibly  those  at  the  seat  of  government  in  Philadelphia. 
The  party  leaders  used  them  with  great  freedom,  and 
the  newspapers  were  proud  to  be  recognized  as  their 
organs.  The  newspaper  of  that  day  was  a  very  differ- 
ent commodity  from  that  which  is  now  spread  before  the 
country  every  hour  of  every  day  in  the  year.  It  was 
small,  rusty  in  appearance,  generally  in  some  kind  of 
a  fight,  and  of  course  without  the  benefit  of  steamships^ 
telegraphs,  lightning  expresses,  or  any  of  the  complicated 
agencies  by  which  news  is  now  collected  and  despatched 
instantaneously  over  the  civilized  world.  The  great  event 
of  the  close  of  the  last  century,  the  death  of  Washing- 
ton, was  unknown  in  Boston  until  eight  days  after  its 
occurrence.  The  latest  news  from  Philadelphia  on  the 
morning  of  the  1st  January,  1800,  was  six  days  old, 
and  from  many  of  the  towns  in  Massachusetts  was  hardly 
better.  Two  days  after  the  exciting  State  election  of 
the  following  year  but  sixty-two  of  the  three  hundred  and 
ninety-eight  incorporated  towns  in  Massachusetts  (then 
including  Maine)  had  reported ;  and  it  was  a  month  later 
when  the  "  Centinel "  announced  the  full  result.  The  news 
by  sea  came  still  more  slowly.  On  the  15th  March,  1800, 
there  had  been  no  news  from  Europe  for  eighty-three  days, 
and  it  was  not  until  a  week  later  that  a  sailing-vessel,  arriv- 
ing unexpectedly  at  New  York,  brought  news  to  the  middle 
of  December  —  more  than  three  months  earlier  —  of  the 
election  of  Bonaparte  as  First  Consul  and  the  new  Con- 
stitution of  the  French  Republic.  Many  worthy  people 
thought  even  this  sleepy  method  was  much  too  rapid. 
John  Pickering,  the  uncle  of  Timothy,  was  made  very 
unhappy  when,  in  1796,  the  "  Salem  Gazette,"  which  had 
been  printed  weekly  till  that  time,  began  to  appear  twice 
a  week.  "  It  never  had  been  printed  but  once  a  week," 


he  said  mournfully,  "  and  that  was  often  enough.  It 
was  nonsense  to  disturb  the  people's  minds  by  sending 
newspapers  among  them  twice  a  week  to  take  their  at- 
tention from  the  duties  they  had  to  perform !  " 

In  those  stirring  debates  the  newspapers  had,  if  not  the 
most  elevating,  certainly  a  very  important  part.  Of  the 
journals  of  the  Revolution,  the  u  Boston  Gazette,"  the 
"  Massachusetts  Spy,"  the  "  Salem  Gazette,"  the  "  Connect- 
icut Courant,"  the  "  Newport  Mercury,"  the  "  Independent 
Chronicle,"  and  others  to  be  mentioned  hereafter,  were  still 
in  existence  ;  but  new  journals,  managed  in  a  more  ag- 
gressive spirit,  soon  took  the  lead,  and  kept  it  during 
this  entire  period.  Of  these  the  "  Columbian  Centinel " 
was  the  most  conspicuous  and  the  most  influential.  It  was 
established  in  1784.  Benjamin  Russell,  its  founder  and 
editor  for  more  than  a  generation,  was  then  in  his  twenty- 
third  year.  For  a  time  his  paper  was  not  one  to  be  proud 
of.  Its  news  was  meagre,  fragmentary,  and  ill-arranged ; 
and  its  original  matter  was  trivial,  narrow,  and  provincial. 
Warden,  his  business  partner,  died  in  two  years.  The 
publishers  already  in  the  'field  were  not  cordial  to  the 
new  comer.  But  the  "  Centinel "  matured  rapidly.  Shays' 
Rebellion,  which  it  exposed  and  fought  gallantly,  intro- 
duced a  broader  spirit  into  its  scanty  columns,  and  pre- 
pared the  way  for  the  better  service  the  journal  was  to  do 
for  the  Constitution  and  the  Federal  party  in  later  years. 
For  the  Constitution  Russell  labored  without  ceasing.  In 
that  noble  service  he  knew  neither  rest  nor  sleep.  Be- 
tween his  office  in  State  Street  and  the  Green  Dragon 
Tavern  he  gave  the  enemies  of  the  Constitution  no  peace. 
In  his  paper  he  delighted  in  ingenious  devices  to  attract 
attention  and  to  excite  interest  in  his  cause.  Pictures, 
such  as  the  meagre  furnishing  of  a  New  England  printing- 


10 


office  in  those  times  could  afford ;  curious  mechanical  ar- 
rangements of  type  ;  a  reckless  display  of  capitals,  and 
extravagant  allegories  in  prose  and  verse,  —  these  were 
his  constant  resource  when  he  had  reached  the  end  of 
his  argument.  He  announced  the  meeting  of  the  Con- 
vention of  1788  in  verse,  as  follows  :  — 

Concentred  HERE  the  united  wisdom  shines, 
Of  learned  JUDGES  and  of  sound  DIVINES  ; 
PATRIOTS  whose  virtues  searching  times  have  tried, 
HEROES  who  fought  where  BROTHER  HEROES  died  ; 
LAWYERS  who  speak  as  TULLY  spoke  before, 
SAGES  deep  read  in  philosophic  lore  ; 
MERCHANTS  whose  plans  are  to  no  realm  confined, 
FARMERS,  the  noblest  title  of  mankind ; 
YEOMEN  and  TRADESMEN,  pillars  of  the  State, 
On  whose  decision  hangs  COLUMBIA'S  fate. 

From  that  time,  till  the  Constitution  was  ratified  by  the 
thirteen  States,  Mr.  Russell  and  the  "  Centinel "  devoted 
all  their  powers  to  its  advocacy.  He  attended  all  the  ses- 
sions of  the  Convention,  and  reported  the  debates  in  a 
shorthand  of  his  own  contrivance.  He  wrote  vigorous 
and  stimulating  paragraphs  for  every  number  of  his  paper, 
and  sustained  the  popular  interest  by  songs  and  allegories, 
in  the  composition  of  which  he  took  great  satisfaction.  On 
the  4th  of  March,  1789,  — twelve  years  before  the  epitaph 
quoted  in  the  beginning,  —  he  celebrated  what  he  vainly 
thought  was  the  death  and  burial  of  anti-federalism,  in  an 
abusive  account  of  the  supposed  funeral  festivities.  First 
came  — 

The  DEMON  of  REBELLION, 
drawn  in  a  flaming  car  by  Ignorance,  Knavery,  and  Idleness. 

DANIEL  SH YS  and  JOHN  FRANKLIN, 

armed  with  levellers  in  their  right  and  halters  in  their  left  hands. 
DAY,  SHATTUCK,  etc.,  their  followers,  two  and  two, 

each  with  caps  and  bells. 
Several  "great  men,"  their  abettors,  in  disguise. 


11 


Then  came  the  Body,  led  by  the  Chief  Physician,  fol- 
lowed by  the  Chief  mourner  the  Devil,  and  supported  on 
either  side  by  Injustice,  Abuse,  Prevarication,  Knavery, 
Defamation,  and  Falsehood. 

The  "  Centinel "  at  this  time,  like  the  "  Massachusetts 
Spy  "  and  other  Federalist  journals,  advocated  the  use  of 
titles  in  connection  with  the  higher  offices  of  the  State  and 
Nation ;  and  the  controversies  growing  out  of  it  were  often 
pitiful  in  their  bitterness  and  triviality.  Still,  in  spite  of 
its  limitations  the  "  Centinel "  was  growing  steadily  in 
position  and  influence,  and  fought  the  earlier  battles  of 
its  party  with  wonderful  energy.  Personalities  of  the 
most  disgraceful  kind  abounded  in  all  the  political  jour- 
nals, and  in  this  respect  the  "  Centinel "  was  neither 
worse  nor  better  than  the  rest  of  them. 

But  this  abusive  habit  did  not  stand  in  the  way  of  qual- 
ities much  more  respectable  and  worthy  of  high  praise.  In 
a  turbulent  time  the  "  Centinel"  was  always  on  the  side  of 
law  and  order;  and  while  many  powerful  influences  were 
working  together  to  make  this  interesting  experiment  in 
popular  government  a  failure,  no  thought  or  word  of  dis- 
loyalty ever  employed  its  energies.  In  the  excitement  of 
the  times  Russell  drew  around  him  the  most  eminent  Fed- 
eralist writers  in  America.  Their  contributions  were  al- 
ways written  with  fervor  and  ability,  and  helped  towards 
the  large  influence  he  exercised  at  the  close  of  the  last  and 
the  beginning  of  the  present  century.  Stephen  Higginson, 
an  intelligent  and  enterprising  merchant,  "  as  honest  a  man 
as  ever  lived,"1  began  in  the  "  Centinel  "  during  the  fol- 
lowing winter  essays  over  the  signature  of  "  Laco,"  sharply 

1  " '  Laco,'  a  writer  in  the  newspapers  of  much  celebrity  in  those  days, 
was  generally  supposed  to  be  Stephen  Higginson,  who  was  certainly  as  hon- 
est a  man  as  ever  lived,  and  one  of  my  father's  especial  friends."  —  Memoir 
of  Theophilus  Parsons,  Chief  Justice,  etc.  By  his  son,  THEOPHILUS  PARSONS. 
Boston,  1859. 


12 


attacking  Governor  Hancock,  and  dealing  with  many  public 
questions  with  pungency  and  spirit  unknown  before. 
Ames,  Sullivan,  Cabot,  the  younger  Lowell,  and  others 
were  frequent  or  occasional  contributors. 

Russell  gave  great  attention  at  the  time  to  domestic  and 
foreign  news.  His  paper  was  an  epitome  of  the  current 
history  of  the  world.  "  I  pray  you,"  said  Fisher  Ames,  writ- 
ing from  Congress  to  Christopher  Gore  in  Boston,  "  send 
me  sometimes  pamphlets  or  papers  to  give  me  just  ideas  of 
European  politics."  The  "  Centinel  "  was  especially  emi- 
nent in  its  knowledge  of  the  military  movements  of  Bona- 
parte and  the  armies  with  which  he  was  at  war.  When 
Talleyrand  and  the  Due  de  Chartres  (Louis  Philippe)  were 
exiles  in  Boston,  they  were  Russell's  most  frequent  visitors, 
and  drew  from  his  files  materials  for  their  inexhaustible  con- 
versation. The  future  King  of  France  was  living,  in  1798, 
according  to  the  tradition,  with  a  French  tailor  near  the 
corner  of  Marshall  and  Union  Streets,  and  was  within  a 
stone's  throw  of  the  "  Centinel "  office,  then  on  the  site  of 
the  "  Traveller  "  building  in  State  Street. 

I  cannot  follow  the  "  Centinel  "  through  the  exciting 
controversies  of  the  next  fifteen  years.  It  fought  Jefferson 
and  every  measure  of  his  administration  with  the  same  per- 
sistent energy  with  which  it  had  sustained  Washington 
and  his  policy.  It  was  always  in  the  thickest  of  the  fight, 
and  is  responsible  for  no  small  share  of  the  bad  temper  and 
bad  manners  with  which  the  most  serious  public  contro- 
versies were  carried  on.  This  could  not  last  always ;  as 
the  "  Centinel "  and  its  tireless  editor  advanced  in  years, 
their  influence  declined  ;  and  when  Major  Russell  retired 
in  1828,  there  was  little  left  of  its  original  vigor  and  power. 
He  had  survived,  however,  the  ephemeral  animosities  of  a 
generation,  and  his  younger  contemporaries  united  in  pay- 
ing him  the  most  cordial  and  sympathetic  respect.  Nathan 


13 


Hale  presided  at  a  banquet  in  his  honor,  and  expressed  the 
sentiments  of  those  who  knew  Major  Russell  best,  in  saying 
that  he  was  to  be  honored  for  many  things,  but  especially 
for  his  efforts  in  rearing  the  edifice  of  our  national  Consti- 
tution. "  The  pillars  of  this  fabric,"  said  Mr.  Hale,  "  as 
they  were  slowly  and  laboriously  reared,  were  delineated 
on  the  print  of  his  newspaper ;  and  those  who  were  en- 
gaged in  this  task  were  constantly  aided,  encouraged,  and 
cheered  by  the  agency  of  his  indefatigable  press.  For 
forty  years  it  was  a  most  important  agency  in  forming  the 
public  mind,  diffusing  knowledge  and  sound  principles,  cor- 
recting errors,  promoting  useful  objects,  advancing  the  wel- 
fare and  securing  the  good  order  of  society."  Mr.  Bucking- 
ham of  the  "  Courier,"  Mr.  Young  of  the  "  Palladium," 
Mr.  Prentiss  of  the  "  Keene  Sentinel,"  John  Pierpont,  the 
brothers  Greene  of  the  "  Statesman "  (Nathaniel  and 
Charles),  Mr.  Clapp  of  the  "  Evening  Gazette,"  Mr.  Willis 
of  the  "  Recorder,"  and  many  others,  —  some  of  them  still 
living,  —  joined  in  this  tribute  to  Major  Russell,  and  in 
paying  compliments  to  one  another  unheard  of  before. 

Major  Russell  was  a  man  of  great  public  spirit.  He  was 
in  public  employment  of  one  kind  or  another  to  the  end  of 
his  days,  in  1845,  when  he  had  reached  the  age  of  eighty- 
four  years.  He  was  buried  in  the  Old  Granary  ;  and  his 
memory  remains  as  that  of  the  most  zealous,  laborious, 
painstaking,  often-mistaken,  but  always  right-minded  and 
patriotic  journalist  whose  name  lives  in  our  annals.  In 
1830  the  "  Centinel  "  absorbed  the  "  New  England  Pal- 
ladium," and  in  1836  "  Russell's  Gazette,"  the  successor  of 
Edes's  ;  but  the  union  could  not  sustain  its  declining  vigor, 
and,  in  1840,  its  identit}T  was  lost  in  the  "Daily  Adver- 
tiser," which  now  represents  the  traditions  of  these  and 
several  other  widely  different  and,  in  their  days,  powerful 
agencies  of  public  influence. 


14 


Contemporary  with  the  "  Centinel,"  and  at  the  opposite 
extreme  on  all  the  questions  of  the  time,  were  two  journals 
very  different  from  each  other,  —  the  "  Boston  Gazette  " 
and  the  "  Independent  Chronicle."  The  first  "  Boston 
Gazette  "  was  founded  in  1719,  in  Court  Street,  where  the 
"  Advertiser"  building  now  stands.  There  also  James 
Franklin  had  printed  the  "New  England  Courant " 
in  1721,  with  Benjamin  Franklin  as  his  apprentice.  The 
house  became  in  1769  the  office  of  Edes  and  Gill,  publish- 
ers of  the  "  Boston  Gazette  and  Country  Journal,"  which 
they  had  established  a  few  years  before  (April,  1755). 
They  moved  across  the  street  after  the  siege  to  the  present 
site  of  the  Adams  Express  Company,  where  the  later  plans 
of  the  Revolution  were  perfected  and  organized.  Driven 
to  Watertown  during  the  seige,  the  untiring  printers  re- 
turned to  the  old  site  on  the  south  side  of  Court  Street  and 
continued  the  warfare.  The  "  Gazette  "  was  the  chief 
pillar  of  the  patriot  cause  in  Boston  during  the  Revolution. 
But  its  glory  departed  with  the  uplifting  and  sustaining 
inspirations  of  that  period.  The  great  spirits  who  had 
gathered  around  and  sustained  its  founder  fell  away  one  by 
one,  —  Otis,  Quincy,  Warren,  John  and  Samuel  Adams, — 
and  with  them  departed  much  of  the  spirit  of  the  patriot 
editor  himself.  In  the  contest  over  the  Constitution  he 
took  the  losing  side,  and  managed  it  in  so  bitter  and  hostile 
a  spirit  as  to  alienate  the  respect  of  friends  whom  he  could 
ill  afford  to  lose.  He  tolerated  Washington ;  but  Adams, 
Hamilton,  Marshall,  and  other  friends  and  companions  he 
pursued  with  unsparing  malice.  The  funding  bill,  Jay's 
treaty,  indeed  all  the  great  salutary  measures  of  the  first 
twelve  years  under  the  Constitution,  he  ridiculed,  satir- 
ized, and  denounced  with  every  variety  of  contemptuous  ex- 
pression. Other  journals  in  Court  Street  retorted  in  the 
same  spirit. 


15 


"Press  answers  press  ;  retorting  slander  flies, 
And  Court  Street  rivals  Billingsgate  in  lies  "  — 

was  the  reputation  it  acquired  in  the  street  doggerel  of  the 
hour.  The  fire  of  youth  and  the  inspiration  of  a  good 
cause  were  needed  to  sustain  a  journal  under  such  circum- 
stances; and  these  the  "Gazette"  no  longer  had.  It  ex- 
pired, little  lamented,  in  1798.  The  venerable  editor 
having  appealed  in  vain  for  consideration,  on  account  of 
the  patriotic  services  of  his  youth  and  manhood,  retired  in 
his  old  age  to  his  forlorn  house  in  Temple  Street,  where, 
doing  odd  jobs  of  printing  with  a  hand-press  and  the  rem- 
nants of  old  fonts  saved  from  the  wreck  of  his  fortunes,  he 
spent  the  last  unhappy  years  of  his  life.1  Neglected,  op- 
pressed by  poverty,  almost  forgotten,  he  passed  away  in 
1803,  at  the  age  of  eighty  years. 

This  too  brief  sketch  covers  only  the  latest  and  least 
useful  period  in  the  life  of  Benjamin  Edes.  In  justice  to 
him  it  is  necessary  to  recall  the  heroic  service  he  rendered 
to  the  country  at  a  time  when  friends  were  few,  and  prop- 
erty, honor,  and  life  were  staked  upon  the  issue.  From 
1765  to  the  close  of  the  Revolution  the  "  Boston  Gazette  " 
filled  a  great  place  in  American  history.  It  was  one  of  the 
chief  centres  of  influence  and  power  in  the  great  struggle. 
The  statesmen  and  writers  of  the  Revolution  early  recog- 
nized its  importance,  and  gave  to  it  their  confidence,  sym- 
pathy, and  generous  co-operation.  The  public  opinion  of 

1  "  In  1801  I  had  occasion  to  call  upon  him  at  his  printing  room,  and 
found  him  at  work  on  a  small  job  at  the  case,  while  an  elderly  female  (prob- 
ably one  of  his  daughters)  was  at  the  press  striking  off  shop-bills.  The  ven- 
erable form  of  the  old  man  setting  types, '  with  spectacles  on  nose/  and  the 
singular  sight  of  a  woman  beating  and  pulling  at  the  press,  together  with  the 
aspect  of  destitution  that  pervaded  the  whole  apartment,  presented  a  scene 
well  adapted  to  excite  sympathy,  and  to  make  an  impression  on  the  mind 
which  the  vicissitudes  of  fifty  years  have  not  effaced."  —  Specimens  of  News- 
paper Literature,  by  JOSEPH  T.  BUCKINGHAM. 


16 


the  colonies  was  formed  and  stimulated  by  its  ringing  argu- 
ment, exhortation,  and  appeal.  The  chartered  rights  of 
the  colonies  had  in  it  a  most  gallant  and  successful  de- 
fender. The  stamp  tax,  the  Boston  Massacre,  the  tax  on 
tea,  the  closing  of  the  port,  and  indeed  every  crisis  of 
liberty  till  its  triumph  in  1783  found  the  "  Gazette " 
awake  and  alert.  Benjamin  Edes  was  its  ruling  and 
directing  spirit  during  all  these  years;  and  his  unsel- 
fish and  devoted  labor  fairly  earned  for  him  a  happier 
fate  than  that  which  befell  him  when  the  struggle  was 
over. 

In  striking  contrast  was  the  fortune  of  his  friend  and  fel- 
low-laborer in  the  Revolution,  Isaiah  Thomas.  In  a  less 
advantageous  field  the  "  Spy  "  grew  steadily  in  prosperity 
and  influence.  If  it  wanted  something  of  the  dash  and 
fire  which  distinguished  its  youth,  it  profited  by  the  stead- 
iness and  wisdom  of  riper  years.  The  prosperity  of  his 
paper  and  his  own  sagacity  enabled  Mr.  Thomas  to  extend 
his  business  connections  into  other  States,  and  to  the  then 
distant  cities  of  Albany  and  Baltimore.  He  prepared  and 
published  his  "History  of  Printing;"  he  founded  and 
endowed  the  American  Antiquarian  Society ;  he  was  rec- 
ognized and  honored  by  many  learned  bodies ;  and  died  at 
the  age  of  eighty-two  years  esteemed  and  honored  through- 
out New  England. 

The  last  lament  of  Edes's  "  Gazette  "  was  hardly  for- 
gotten when  "  Russell's  Gazette :  Commercial  arid  Polit- 
ical," began  to  attract  attention.  Messrs.  J.  and  J.  N. 
Russell  had  begun  a  publication  three  years  earlier  (Sep- 
tember, 1795),  as  the  "  Boston  Price  Current  and  Marine 
Intelligencer."  But  the  times  growing  stormy,  and  the 
field  inviting  to  a  man  of  active  temperament  like  John 


17 


Russell,  he  enlarged  his  paper  to  the  conventional  size, 
named  it  as  above  stated,  and  thenceforward,  till  the  end 
of  the  war,  took  a  vigorous  part  in  the  political  contests 
of  the  day.  He  was  a  younger  brother  of  Benjamin 
Russell,  of  the  "  Centinel,"  and,  like  him,  a  stalwart  Fed- 
eralist. He  was  a  sentinel  on  the  watch-towers  of  his 
party,  and  was  forever  sounding  alarms.  He  religiously 
shut  his  eyes  to  the  faults  of  his  own  party  and  to  the 
virtues  of  its  enemies.  His  paper  was  never  known  to 
discover  a  flaw  in  the  one,  nor  anything  but  the  abomi- 
nation of  desolation  in  the  other.  Out  of  politics  he  was 
gentleness  itself,  and  was  particularly  amiable  to  the  dra- 
matic profession,  whom,  in  that  day  of  comparatively  small 
things,  he  took  under  his  especial  protection.  Thomas 
(Robert  Treat)  Paine,  poet  and  scholar,  John  Lothrop, 
pastor  of  the  Second  Church,  Thomas  O.  Selfridge,  Da- 
vid Everett,  and  many  of  the  young  men  of  the  town 
with  literary  gifts  and  a  taste  for  politics  were  regular 
contributors  to  the  new  "  Gazette,"  —  though  the  "  Cen- 
tinel "  and  the  "Palladium"  still  held  their  places  as  ac- 
credited organs  of  Federalism  in  this  region.  Mr.  Rus- 
sell was  followed  in  the  "  Gazette  "  by  Simon  Gardner,  a 
young  man  of  rare  talents  who  died  in  his  thirty-fourth 
year  before  their  promise  was  fully  realized,  Samuel  L. 
Knapp  the  well-known  lawyer  and  writer,  Alden  Brad- 
ford historian,  and  the  late  Dr.  Joseph  Palmer.  In  a 
few  years  the  last  "  Gazette  "  was  merged  into  the  "  Pal- 
ladium and  Centinel,"  which  was  in  turn  absorbed,  as  the 
"  Independent  Chronicle "  had  been  already,  by  the 
u  Daily  Advertiser." 

Side  by  side  with  Edes's  "  Gazette,"  and  of  the  same 
political  opinions,  was  the  "  Independent  Chronicle."  Es- 
tablished in  1776,  in  the  midst  of  the  Revolution,  it  im- 

3 


18 


bibed  at  that  time  the  extreme  views  of  liberty  and 
democracy  which  marked  its  whole  career.  It  was,  at 
the  time  of  the  controversy  over  the  Constitution,  hold- 
ing an  important  place  in  the  community  as  a  political 
and  commercial  journal.  It  hated  England  and  admired 
France  with  equal  cordiality.  It  had  already  resisted 
the  return  of  the  Tory  refugees  to  citizenship  and  prop- 
erty rights.  It  opposed  the  institution  of  the  Society  of 
the  Cincinnati,  as  an  attempt  to  establish  an  order  of  Amer- 
ican nobility.  It  resisted,  with  still  more  savage  energy, 
the  new  Constitution,  on  the  ground  of  its  aristocratic 
tendency  and  its  antagonism  to  popular  liberty.  In  the 
evolution  of  parties,  it  became  naturally  the  leading  organ 
in  New  England  of  the  Democratic  or  JefFersonian  school 
of  political  ideas.  From  this  time  till  the  close  of  the 
century  Captain  Thomas  Adams  was  the  principal  pro- 
prietor. The  cares  of  business  and  declining  health, 
aggravated  by  prosecutions  growing  out  of  his  opposi- 
tion to  the  alien  and  sedition  laws,  then  compelled  him 
to  retire. 

He  was  succeeded  by  James  White,  a  respectable  book- 
seller in  Court  Street,  with  Ebenezer  Rhoades,  then  a 
young  man,  as  editor.  For  twenty  years,  with  occa- 
sional change  of  partners,  he  remained  in  this  position. 
He  wrote  usually  with  great  brevity,  but  with  vigor  and 
spirit.  To  say  that  he  was  personal  and  vindictive  in 
controversy  is  only  to  repeat  that  he  faithfully  followed 
the  fashion.  Among  the  able  men  who  contributed  to 
his  paper  were  Benjamin  Austin,  a  leading  merchant ; 
Perez  Morton,  afterwards  Attorney-General ;  Thomas 
Greenleaf,  afterwards  editor  of  the  New  York  "  Journal 
and  Argus ; "  Dr.  Charles  Jarvis,  Samuel  Cooper,  and 
others  whose  names  are  now  forgotten.  Mr.  Austin  was 
the  most  frequent  contributor  and  the  most  deeply  in 


19 


earnest.  The  office  of  the  "  Chronicle,"  on  the  spot  al- 
ready consecrated  by  Franklin  and  Edes,  was  mid-way 
between  his  house  at  the  foot  of  Hancock  Street  and  his 
place  of  business  on  Long  Wharf;  and  for  twenty  years 
it  was  his  custom  to  stop  on  his  way  down  town  to  chat 
with  the  editor,  to  get  the  latest  intelligence  of  public 
events,  to  write  a  paragraph  or  an  essay,  or  to  mature 
plans  for  the  advancement  of  the  measures  in  which  he 
was  interested. 

The  famous  tragedy  of  1806  threw  a  cloud  over  his 
life,  but  did  not  silence  him.  Politics  were  then  at  fever- 
heat  in  Boston.  Both  parties  had  celebrated  the  Fourth 
of  July  that  year,  —  the  Federalists  at  Faneuil  Hall,  the 
Republicans  at  Copp's  Hill.  Some  trivial  dispute  arose 
about  the  payment  of  the  bills,  which  grew  into  a  State 
quarrel.  Mr.  Austin  of  the  Republican  committee  and 
Thomas  O.  Selfridge  of  the  Federalist  committee  posted 
each  other  as  cowards  and  liars.  The  same  day  Charles, 
son  of  Mr.  Austin,  a  youth  of  nineteen,  a  Senior  in 
Harvard  College,  met  Mr.  Selfridge  in  State  Street,  and 
a  moment  after,  high  words  having  apparently  passed 
between  them,  Selfridge  drew  a  pistol  and  fired.  Austin 
struck  his  assailant,  or  struck  at  him,  fell  to  the  pave- 
ment and  expired,  the  ball  having  entered  his  heart.  For 
many  weeks  the  "  Chronicle  "  and  its  Republican  contem- 
poraries were  infuriated,  and  charged  the  leading  Feder- 
alists with  murder,  treason,  and  every  conceivable  crime. 
The  trial  of  Selfridge,  the  arguments  of  counsel,  the 
charge  of  Chief-Justice  Parsons,  the  acquittal,  and  the 
public  excitement,  made  this  event  one  of  the  most  start- 
ling in  the  annals  of  this  community,  and  certainly  the 
most  stirring  one  in  its  newspaper  history. 

The  "  Chronicle  "  had  some  literary  qualities  above  its 
contemporaries,  and  in  other  respects  it  was  a  fair  ex- 


20 


ample  of  the  party  press  of  that  period.  Responsible 
editors,  as  a  rule,  wrote  comparatively  little.  They  were 
the  channels  through  whom  the  party  chiefs  were  heard  ; 
and  the  ablest  writers  the  new  republic  could  command 
gave  them  their  chief  interest  and  influence.  The  "  Chron- 
icle "  was  merged  with  the  "  Boston  Patriot "  in  1819,  and 
the  "Patriot"  with  the  "  Daily  Advertiser "  a  few  years 
later. 

The  New  England  Federalists  were  greatly  aided  in  the 
crisis  of  their  fortunes  by  the  "  New  England  Palladium," 
begun  as  the  "  Massachusetts  Mercury  "  in  1793,  under  the 
auspices  of  Alexander  Young  and  Samuel  Etheridge, — 
the  latter  retiring  the  next  year  in  favor  of  Thomas  Minns. 
They  set  out  to  make  a  journal  free,  they  said,  from  "  that 
low  ribaldry  and  personal  defamation  which  frequently 
disgraced  European  publications,  and  sometimes  contami- 
nated the  purer  effusions  of  the  American  press."  They 
made  rapid  progress,  became  the  State  printers,  and  had 
their  paper  on  a  good  foundation  before  the  close  of  the 
century.  The  leading  Federalists  in  New  England  at  that 
time  were  looking  about  for  more  satisfactory  and  influ- 
ential organs  than  had  yet  appeared.  The  personalism 
of  the  newspapers  of  both  parties  had  long  displeased 
them.  George  Cabot  wrote  to  Alexander  Hamilton,  Oc- 
tober 11,  1800:  "Dr.  Dwight  [President  of  Yale  College] 
is  here  stirring  us  up  to  oppose  the  demon  of  Jacobinism. 
A  newspaper,  to  be  entitled  the  "New  England  Anti-Ja- 
cobin," is  to  be  published  at  Boston  and  circulated  as  ex- 
tensively as  possible,  especially  through  New  England. 
The  labors  of  many  good  men  are  expected  in  its  support, 
—  yours  among  the  rest."  This  scheme  was  abandoned  ; 
and  their  attention  seems  to  have  been  turned  soon  after 
to  the  "  Mercury,"  which  took  a  new  start  and  the  name 


21 


of  the  "  Palladium"  in  1801  .*  Warren  Button,  a  young 
man  of  talent  and  scholarship,  became  the  chief  editor. 
"  The  principles  we  espouse,"  he  said  in  his  first  number, 
in  a  style  to  which  the  readers  of  newspapers  were  at 
that  time  little  accustomed,  "  will  for  ever  remain  the 
same.  They  are  not  the  doctrines  and  opinions  of  a  day. 
They  do  not  vary  with  every  turn  of  circumstance,  nor 
suit  themselves  to  every  change  of  civil  administration. 
But  they  are  founded  on  the  unchanging  laws  of  truth 
and  justice,  sanctioned  by  long  experience,  and  defended 
by  weapons  tempered  from  the  4  armory  of  God.'  '  Mr. 
Button  wrote  with  uniform  dignity  and  elegance.  "  He 
has  talents,  learning,  and  taste,"  said  Fisher  Ames  in  a 
letter  to  Theodore  Bwight;  "  and,  what  is  better,  he  has 
discretion."  Fisher  Ames  himself,  "  the  wisest  counsel- 
lor as  well  as  the  chief  ornament  of  his  party,"  was  a 
pillar  of  strength  to  the  u  Palladium  "  in  those  early  days. 
He  held  that  "  newspapers  were  an  over-match  for  any 
government,"  and  he  hoped  by  using  them  "  honestly  and 
without  lying"  to  recover  for  his  party  some  of  the 
ground  it  had  lost.  He  summoned  to  its  aid  the  first 
talents  of  the  party.  "  I  think  myself  entitled,"  he  said 
in  the  letter  to  Mr.  Bwight  already  mentioned,  "  to  call 
upon  you,  and  to  ask  you  to  call  upon  the  mighty  Trurn- 
bull,  who  must  not  slumber  like  Achilles  in  his  tent 

1  FISHER  AMES  TO  THOMAS  DWIGHT. 

DEDHAM,  1st  January,  1801. 

MY  DEAR  FRIEND,  —  ...  They  talk  strongly  of  preferring  Burr  to  Jef- 
ferson. It  is  said  the  Feds  can  decide  which  shall  reign.  The  "  Mercury"  or 
"  Palladium  "  is  to  be  the  Federal  paper,  and  pains  must  be  taken  to  spread 
it,  and  gain  readers  and  patrons  in  all  parts  of  New  England.  It  languishes 
hitherto  for  pecuniary  funds.  But  literary  help  will  be  considerable  in  the 
beginning,  and  unless  (this  in  confidence)  K.,  J.  L.,  and  F.  A.  will  work  for 
it,  the  tug  will  soon  become  hard.  One  of  the  three  is  very  lazy ;  but  as 
he  can  and  will  write  when  he  is,  and  because  he  is,  there  is  a  chance  he 
will  yawn  over  pieces  that  will  set  the  readers  yawning. 


22 


while  the  camp  is  in  danger  of  being  forced.  Mr.  Wol- 
cott  must  be  summoned  to  give  his  counsel,  as  well  as 
to  mend  his  excellent  pen.  Connecticut  is  the  lifeguard 
of  liberty  and  federalism.  I  am  trying  to  sound  the 
tocsin."  George  Cabot,  the  distinguished  merchant  and 
able  and  patriotic  statesman,  wrote  occasionally  for  the 
"  Mercury  "  and  "  Palladium,"  as  he  had  done  for  the  "Cen- 
tinel."  Fisher  Ames  himself  was  a  constant  and  faithful 
contributor.  John  Lowell,  the  eminent  lawyer,  saved 
time  from  his  engrossing  occupations  to  write  upon  all 
the  burning  questions  of  that  fiery  period.  "  If  you  have 
seen  our  newspapers,"  wrote  George  Cabot  to  Timothy 
Pickering,  January,  1808,  "  you  see  how  much  Mr.  Low- 
ell has  done  ;  and  you  must  be  gratified  to  see  how  well 
supported  by  authorities,  by  the  practice  of  nations,  and 
by  sound  reason  the  Boston  opinions  have  been."  Mr. 
Lowell  came  into  the  conflict  later  than  the  rest;  but 
when  he  came  it  was  with  his  whole  soul.  The  issues  of 
the  day  took  possession  of  him,  and  gave  speed  and  fire 
to  tongue  and  pen.1 

Messrs.  Young  and  Minns  retired  from  the  "Palladium" 
in  1828,  after  a  successful  partnership  of  nearly  forty 
years.  It  was  the  "  era  of  good  feeling  "  indeed  with  the 
journalists  of  Boston,  who  gave  a  complimentary  dinner 
to  the  retiring  publishers.  Benjamin  Russell  presided. 
The  late  Dr.  Young,  son  of  one  of  the  guests,  was  chaplain. 
Toasts  without  number  were  drunk  in  due  order,  and 
cordial  tributes  were  paid  to  them  for  their  useful  and 
exemplary  services.  Nothing  more  signally  marked  the 

1  The  "Palladium"  began  the  modern  fashion  of  reporting  ship-news. 
Harry  Ingraham  Blake  was  the  inventor,  and  for  many  years  was  without  a 
rival.  Clearances,  arrivals,  disasters,  and  the  ten  thousand  incidents  con- 
nected with  the  sea-faring  interest  came  to  him  with  marvellous  celerity 
and  accuracy. 


change  that  had  taken  place  in  the  manners  and  spirit 
of  the  times,  as  well  as  in  the  relations  of  the  different 
journals  with  each  other,  than  the  favor  accorded  to  a 
sentiment  given  by  Deacon  Loring  of  the  "  Christian 
Watchman,"  noting  especially  the  triumph  of  "  that  spirit 
of  urbanity  which  points  out  the  mode  of  managing  a  con- 
troversy without  endeavoring  to  find  in  personal  abuse 
an  apology  for  courteous  argument."  Mr.  Young  and 
Mr.  Minns  both  died  in  1834,  universally  beloved  and 
respected. 

Several  other  journals  played  an  interesting  part  in  the 
daily  activities  of  that  time.  The  "  Federal  Orrery  "  was 
one  of  the  best  of  them.  Thomas  (Robert  Treat)  Paine 
founded  it  in  1794.  He  had  graduated  at  Harvard  Col- 
lege two  years  earlier,  with  a  reputation  for  scholarship 
flavored  with  audacity,  —  having  insisted  upon  speaking 
at  Commencement  an  anti-Jacobin  prologue  to  his  part, 
although  the  College  authorities  had  prudently  crossed  it 
out.  He  was  in  politics  an  ardent  Federalist,  aggressive 
and  implacable.  During  the  three  years  he  was  in  harness 
he  had  a  variety  of  correspondents,  who  kept  the  commu- 
nity in  a  fever  of  agitation.  The  rector  of  Trinity  Church, 
Mr.  Gardner,  the  reputed  author  of  "  Remarks  on  the 
Jacobiniad,  '  a  satire  in  prose  and  verse,  was  one  of  them  ; 
William  Biglow,  a  more  gentle  soul,  given  to  poetry  and 
letters  in  his  sober  moods,  was  another;  Royal  Tyler, 
Joseph  Dennie,  and,  last  but  not  least,  Sarah  Wentworth 
Morton,  "the  American  Sappho,"  were  also  in  the  list. 
Miss  Apthorpe,  afterwards  the  wife  of  Perez  Morton,  had 
been  a  frequent  contributor  to  the  u  Massachusetts  Maga- 
zine "  over  the  signature  of  "  Philenia,"  and  Mr.  Paine  was 
a  most  devoted  admirer  of  her  genius.  Her  works  have 


24 


been  collected  in  two  volumes.  Their  fascination  must 
have  come  from  her  youth  and  personal  charms,  —  and 
these,  alas  !  are  mortal. 

The  "  Constitutional  Telegraphe  "  was  a  short-lived  and 
altogether  discreditable  production  of  this  period.  It  was 
anti-Federalist  in  politics,  and  a  weak  rival  to  the  "  Inde- 
pendent Chronicle."  It  was  printed  twice  a  week.  Sam- 
uel S.  Parker,  a  Worcester-County  physician,  edited  it  for 
a  few  months,  writing,  however,  little  more  than  nagging 
paragraphs  about  the  other  newspapers  in  the  town,  which 
took  no  notice  of  him.  The  visit  of  Alexander  Hamilton 
to  Boston  in  the  summer  of  1800  inspired  him  and  his  cor- 
respondents with  an  access  of  rage,  which  he  poured  out 
upon  Hamilton's  admirers  with  great  volubility.  Dr. 
Parker  was  a  vile  blackguard  ;  and  poor  as  his  abuse  was 
he  seemed  to  have  little  taste  or  spirit  for  anything  else. 
John  S.  Lillie,  an  inveterate  Jeffersonian,  succeeded  him. 
His  chief  exploit  was  in  the  character  of  defendant  in  a 
suit  for  printing  a  libel  against  Judge  Dana  of  the  Supreme 
Court,  for  which  he  was  fined  and  imprisoned  three  months, 
—  to  the  great  satisfaction  of  the  community.  John 
Mosely  Dunham  came  next,  and  changed  the  name  to  the 
"  Republican  Gazetteer ; "  and  was  soon  followed  by  Ben- 
jamin True  and  Benjamin  Parks,  who  again  changed  the 
name  to  the  "  Democrat,"  with  John  Williams  as  editor. 
Williams  was  an  Englishman  by  birth,  best  known  by  his 
alias  of  Anthony  Pasquin.  Gifford  had  immortalized  him, 
before  he  left  England,  as  "  a  profligate  whose  acquain- 
tance was  infamy  and  whose  touch  was  poison."  Williams 
made  pretensions  to  poetry  as  well  as  to  politics,  of  which 
Gifford  spoke  in  a  note  to  the  "  Baviad  "  as  u  licentious  and 
dull  beyond  expression,"  quoting  against  him  at  the  same 


25 


time  certain  uncomplimentary  verses,  purporting  to  be  by 
another  hand.1  For  these  verses  Williams  prosecuted 
GifFord's  publisher,  who  pleaded  the  truth  of  the  libel  and 
won  the  cause.  The  jury  non-suited  him  without  a  mo- 
ment's hesitation,  and  the  audience  hissed  him  out  of  court. 
Without  stopping  to  thank  his  counsel,  he  fled  to  America 
so  rapidly  that  he  is  said  to  have  arrived  a  "little  in  ad- 
vance of  his  reputation."  He  was  for  a  time  a  leading  un- 
acknowledged writer  for  the  "  Independent  Chronicle  ;  " 
and  in  that  capacity  he  fell  under  the  lash  of  the  "  Reper- 
tory," a  dignified  and  able  journal,  which  in  several  succes- 
sive numbers  reprinted  the  record  of  the  trial,  with  Ersk- 
ine's  mocking  defence  of  his  client,  and  with  running  com- 
ments well  suited  to  the  career  and  character  of  such  a 
knave.  Under  all  its  names  and  all  its  managers  the 
"  Democrat "  led  a  turbulent  and  wretched  life ;  and  all 
parties,  as  well  as  all  decently  disposed  citizens,  rejoiced 
when  it  ceased  to  exist,  in  1808. 

i  TO  ANTHONY  PASQUIN,  ESQ. 

Why  dost  thou  tack,  most  simple  Anthony, 
The  name  of  Pasquin  to  thy  ribald  strains  ? 
Is  it  a  fetch  of  wit,  to  let  us  see 
Thou,  like  that  statue,  art  devoid  of  brains  ? 

But  thou  mistak'st ;  for  know,  though  Pasquin's  head 
Be  full  as  hard  and  near  as  thick  as  thine, 
Yet  has  the  world,  admiring,  on  it  read 
Many  a  keen  gibe  and  many  a  sportive  line. 

While  nothing  from  thy  jobbernowl  can  spring 
But  impudence  and  filth ;  for  out,  alas  ! 
Do  what  we  will,  'tis  still  the  same  vile  thing,  — 
Within  all  brick-dust  and  without  all  brass. 

Then  blot  the  name  of  Pasquin  from  thy  page  ! 
Thou  seest  it  will  not  thy  poor  riff-raft'  sell. 
Some  other  would'st  thou  take  1    I  dare  engage 
JOHN  WILLIAMS  or  TOM  FOOL  would  do  as  well. 
4 


26 


The  "  Polar  Star  and  Boston  Daily  Advertiser  "  —  the  first 
attempt  to  print  a  daily  paper  in  Boston  —  was  published 
a  few  months  during  the  autumn  and  winter  of  1798-99. 
John  Burk,  an  Irishman,  fluent,  boastful,  and  self-conscious, 
was  the  editor.  He  took  little  part  in  the  political  discus- 
sions of  the  time,  and  evidently  knew  very  little  about  them. 
"  The  Federal  Gazette  and  Daily  Advertiser  "  took  its 
place  in  the  following  year.  Caleb  P.  Wayne  came  from 
Philadelphia  to  try  the  experiment,  and  returned  after  its 
failure.  It  was  a  virulent,  snarling,  ill-tempered  journal, 
a  feeble  fighter  against  its  enemies,  and  a  discredit  to  the 
cause  it  advocated.  Its  articles  were  brief,  flippant,  perso- 
nal, ungrammatical,  without  grace  of  style,  or  a  suggestion 
of  interest  in  anything  beyond  the  quarrel  of  the  mo- 
ment. Its  existence  was  never  recognized  by  its  more 
judicious  neighbors,  with  whom  it  was  constantly  seeking 
a  quarrel.  It  managed  to  keep  itself  in  hot  water  until  the 
well-merited  indifference  of  the  community  permitted  it 
to  expire.  It  lived  but  three  or  four  months. 

The  "  New  England  Repertory  "  was  begun  atNewbury- 
port  July  10,  1803,  printed  by  John  Barnard  for  John 
Park,  the  proprietor  and  editor.  The  second  number  was 
issued,  after  a  delay  of  a  few  weeks,  in  Boston ;  the  title 
was  changed  to  the  "  Repertory,"  and  there  were  other  me- 
chanical changes.  It  was  printed  in  the  Senate  Cham- 
ber of  the  Old  State  House.  Mr.  Park  contributed  an 
opening  address,  and  made  many  good  promises,  which 
were  faithfully  kept  for  several  years,  or  as  long  as  his 
connection  with  the  paper  continued.  In  1812  the  "  Re- 
pertory and  General  Advertiser  "  was  published  by  William 
W.  Clapp,  at  the  Exchange  Coffee  House.  It  was  still 
edited  by  John  Park,  but  his  name  disappeared  soon  after. 
The  "  Repertory  "  was  conducted  with  eminent  ability  and 


27 


good  judgment.  Of  course  it  took  an  active  part  in  all 
the  political  discussions  of  the  time,  and  had  no  hesitation 
about  engaging  in  the  personal  controversies  they  provoked. 
It  was  the  sworn  foe  of  the  "  Independent  Chronicle,"  and 
pursued  it  and  its  corps  of  writers  with  unsparing  vigilance 
and  energy.  On  the  1st  January,  1814,  Mr.  Park,  having 
retired  from  the  "  Repertory "  some  time  before,  made 
an  arrangement  with  the  printers  Munroe  and  Francis, 
to  publish  for  him  "  The  Boston  Spectator,  devoted  to 
Politics  and  Belles-Lettres."  It  was  not  a  newspaper, 
though  giving  a  weekly  retrospect  or  summary  of  the 
leading  events  of  the  world.  The  editor's  purpose  was  to 
make  a  literary  and  miscellaneous  journal,  and  to  draw 
around  him  a  body  of  easy,  graceful,  and  scholarly  contrib- 
utors. The  exciting  political  questions  growing  out  of  the 
war  were  discussed  by  able  writers,  who  denounced  the 
war  and  its  authors  with  constant  and  vehement  spirit  to 
the  last.  Seventy  weekly  numbers  of  the  "  Spectator " 
only  were  issued,  —  the  last  number  announcing  the  rati- 
fication of  the  treaty  of  peace.1 

On  the  3d  March,  1809,  was  issued  the  first  number  of 
the  "  Boston  Patriot,"  Everett  and  Munroe  publishers. 
It  was  started  as  a  stalwart  supporter  of  the  administration 
of  James  Madison,  and  a  most  zealous  opponent  of  the 
policy  and  measures  of  the  Federalist  party.  David  Ever- 
ett, already  well  known  as  a  political  writer,  was  the  edi- 
tor, and  in  the  first  number  set  forth  his  view  of  the  recip- 
rocal rights  and  powers  of  the  States  and  the  General 
Government  in  a  frank,  manly,  and  very  positive  spirit. 
He  promised  that  while  politics  would  claim  his  chief  atten- 

1  I  am  indebted  to  William  W.  Wheildon  Esq.,  of  Concord,  for  the  use  of 
a  complete  file  of  "  The  Boston  Spectator,"  of  which  there  are,  probably, 
few  copies  preserved. 


28 


tion,  the  great  and  permanent  interests  of  religion,  moral- 
ity, literature,  and  the  municipal  economy  of  the  country 
would  also  be  objects  of  primary  regard ;  and  he  kept  his 
word.  The  first  number  contained  a  vigorous  assault  upon 
"  The  Essex  Junto  "  and  its  alleged  conspiracy  against  the 
Union  ;  also  the  protest  of  a  minority  of  the  State  Senate 
in  support  of  the  embargo  laws,  bearing  the  still  familiar 
names  of  Seth  Sprague,  William  Gray,  Nathaniel  Morton, 
Samuel  Dana,  Nathan  Willis,  and  several  others.  John 
Adams,  then  in  his  seventy-fifth  year,  came  out  of  his  re- 
tirement and  contributed  to  the  "  Patriot "  the  remarkable 
series  of  letters  giving  a  retrospect  and  vindication  of  his 
public  life,  which  at  the  time  attracted  the  attention  of  the 
whole  country.  The  collected  works  of  Fisher  Ames,  who 
had  died  a  few  months  before,  were  just  published,  and 
the  "  Patriot "  devoted  a  large  part  of  its  space  for  many 
months  to  a  bitter  and  sanguinary  review  of  them,  involving 
also  the  whole  tenor  of  his  life  and  character.  l 

In  May,  1817,  the  "  Patriot,"  then  published  by  Davis 
C.  Ballard  and  Edmund  Wright,  Jr.,  bought  the  "  Inde- 
pendent Chronicle,"  and  the  two  papers  were  thenceforward 
published  as  a  daily,  under  the  title  of  the  "  Independent 
Chronicle  and  Boston  Patriot,"  until  the  absorption  of  both 
in  the  "  Daily  Advertiser  "  in  December,  1831. 

During  the  period  following  the  adoption  of  the  Consti- 
tution there  were,  outside  of  Boston,  several  journals  of 

1  The  spirit  which  Mr.  Everett  gave  to  his  paper  during  all  this  warlike 
period  may  be  inferred  from  the  following  postscript  to  one  of  his  more 
elaborate  articles :  "  In  the  firm  belief  in  the  reality  of  its  principles,  the 
'  Boston  Patriot '  has  taken  its  stand  in  the  front  of  the  hottest  battle  ;  and 
now,  while  the  enemy  deliberate  whether  or  not  to  fall  upon  it  with  all  the 
vehemence  of  their  wrath,  the  editor  has  thought  proper  to  reconnoitre 
their  entrenchments,  and  to  show  that  he  will  on  no  occasion  be  found 
sleeping  at  his  post." 


29 


influence  and  ability.  Foremost  among  them  was  the 
"  Salem  Gazette,"  established  in  1787  under  the  name  of 
the  "  Mercury,"  by  Thomas  C.  Gushing,  taking  the  pres- 
ent name  three  years  later.  For  a  short  time  (1794-97) 
William  Carlton  assumed  the  publication,  and  the  Rev. 
Dr.  Bently  began  with  him  the  remarkable  and  altogether 
incomparable  weekly  summaries  of  the  news  of  the  world, 
which  he  continued  in  the  "  Register "  for  twenty-five 
years  after.  Mr.  Gushing  resumed  the  publication  in  1797, 
and  espoused  the  Federalist  cause  decisively  and  aggres- 
sively ;  and  until  the  end,  in  1815,  was  its  most  faithful 
defender.  He  was  known  among  his  friends,  and  lives  in 
the  traditions  of  Essex  County,  as  <;  the  amiable  and  gifted 
Gushing."  But  his  good  temper,  his  pure  character,  and 
his  lovable  nature  were  no  proof  against  the  fierce  tem- 
per of  that  time.  As  a  journalist  he  was  lucid,  earnest, 
and  usually  courteous ;  but  he  spared  no  energy  of  argu- 
ment or  of  denunciation  which  his  cause  seemed  to  him 
to  require. 

The  great  contest  of  1802  between  Jacob  Crowninshield 
and  Timothy  Pickering  for  Congress,  Republican  and  Fed- 
eralist,—  the  "  Register,"  conducted  by  William  Carlton, 
representing  the  former,  the  "  Gazette  "  the  latter,  —  is 
historical.  Nothing  like  it  has  been  known,  or  would  be 
possible,  in  our  time.  Blows  were  given  and  received 
without  mercy.  Captain  Crowninshield  in  company  with 
Joseph  Story,  then  a  young  lawyer  in  the  first  flush  of  his 
youthful  genius,  and  a  writer  of  political  articles  for  the 
"  Register,"  called  upon  Mr.  Gushing  and  threatened  to 
shoot  him  if  he  continued  his  assaults.  "  The  Register," 
at  the  same  time  or  soon  after,  was  held  in  a  suit  for  libel 
on  Timothy  Pickering,  for  which  the  editor  was  convicted, 
fined,  and  imprisoned.  Yet  it  must  be  said  that  both  jour- 
nals were  conducted  with  eminent  ability  and  comparative 


30 


decorum.  I  have  read  the  old  files  diligently,  and  it  needs 
much  reading  between  the  lines  to  discover  the  causes  of 
the  convulsion  which  rent  parties  and  society  asunder  in 
that  stormy  time. 

Mr.  Gushing  retired  in  1822.  His  fighting  days  had  long 
been  over.  Mr.  Buckingham,  who  speaks  kindly  of  every 
one,  is  especially  kind  to  him.  "  The  qualities  of  his  heart," 
he  says,  "  were  not  less  amiable  than  the  faculties  of  his 
mind  were  respectable.  His  bosom  was  the  seat  of  all  the 
gentle  virtues  ;  his  benevolence  was  unwearied ;  his  friend- 
ship disinterested,  ardent,  and  sincere  ;  his  integrity  stead- 
fast, incorruptible,  and  unsuspected."  Caleb  Gushing,  his 
illustrious  son,  conducted  the  paper  for  a  few  months ;  but 
the  son  had  larger  plans  in  view,  and  left  it  in  the  hands  of 
Mr.  Ferdinand  Andrews,  who  in  1827  transferred  it  to 
Mr.  Foote,  the  present  senior  proprietor,  who  for  more  than 
half  a  century  has  made  the  "  Salem  Gazette  "  a  name  for 
all  that  is  pure,  honest,  and  of  good  report  in  its  profes- 
sion, and  who  still  lives  in  the  enjoyment  of  a  serene  and 
honored  old  age. 

The  "  Salem  Register  "  began  in  May,  1800,  as  an  advo- 
cate of  Jefferson  and  all  his  measures.  William  Carleton, 
a  young  man  of  spirit  and  intelligence  trained  in  the 
"  Gazette  "  office,  took  the  laboring  oar,  with  the  co-opera- 
tion of  several  of  the  ablest  writers  in  the  county,  —  then 
distinguished  for  the  number  of  its  able  men.  His  impris- 
onment, in  1803,  for  libel  in  accusing  Timothy  Pickering 
of  taking  bribes  from  Great  Britain  was  a  sad  blow  to  him, 
though  he  had  the  sympathy  of  a  large  and  powerful  party. 
He  died  in  1805  at  the  age  of  thirty-four  years.  His  con- 
stant friend,  Dr.  Bently,  in  writing  his  eulogy  paid  a  loyal 
tribute  to  his  cheerfulness  of  temper,  his  benevolence  of 
mind,  his  perseverance,  integrity,  and  uprightness.  "  He 


31 

was  an  able  editor  and  an  honest  man."  Warwick  Palfray, 
Jr.,  one  of  Carleton's  apprentices,  succeeded  to  the  editor- 
ship, and  continued  in  that  capacity  for  thirty  years.  He 
was  just  out  of  his  minority,  and  entered  upon  his  difficult 
task  with  extraordinary  discretion  and  judgment.  He  was 
a  gentleman  in  his  feelings  and  in  all  the  relations  of  his 
life.  He  had  no  heart  for  conflict.  Through  all  the 
stormy  period  of  the  embargo  and  the  war,  though  up- 
holding the  standard  of  his  party  without  shadow  of  turn- 
ing, he  indulged  in  no  personalities,  he  questioned  no 
man's  motives.  His  generous  sentiments  were  respected 
by  his  opponents,  and  his  successors  have  good  reason  to 
be  proud  of  the  traditions  he  left  to  them. 

In  this  bead-roll  of  newspaper  worthies  Dr.  Bently  must 
not  be  overlooked.      He  was  a  man  of  prodigious  mental 
activity.     Every  week,  for  a  quarter  of  a  century,  he  wrote 
for  the  "  Register,"  without  public  acknowledgment,  his 
remarkable  epitome  of  the  news  of  the  world.     He  was  at 
the  same  time  a  devoted  minister,  writing  and  preaching 
his  two  sermons  every  Sunday  for  thirty-six  years,  and  per- 
forming his  parochial  duties  with  religious  fidelity ;  pursu- 
ing his  insatiable  thirst  for  knowledge  into  every  path ;  an 
expert  in  twenty  languages  and  familiar  with  many  more  ; 
an  unrivalled  scholar  in  Hebrew,  Arabic,  and  Persian  ;  a 
correspondent  of  petty  chiefs  •  in  Arabia  and  Africa  ;    a 
student  in  natural  history ;  an  omnivorous  reader  and  col- 
lector, his  library  being  at  the  time  the  largest  arid  best 
in  the  country,  except  Jefferson's ;  an  ingenious  Biblical 
student  and  critic  ;  and  over,  and  in  the  midst  of,  all  in- 
formed and  interested  in  the  political  and  current  affairs  of 
the  world.     Unlike  the  greater  part  of  the  New  England 
clergy  he  was  a  zealous  Republican,  and  a  friend  of  Jeffer- 
son to  the  last.     His  antiquarian  knowledge  surpassed  that 


32 

of  any  of  his  contemporaries.  He  published  little  except 
in  the  "  Salem  Register,"  which  from  1800  to  1825  is  his 
chief  monument. 

The  "  Greenfield  Gazette,"  now  published  as  the  "  Gazette 
and  Courier,"  had  its  origin  at  this  time  (1792)  under  the 
management  of  Thomas  Dickman.  It  was  a  moderate  Fed- 
eralist journal,  and  counted  many  noted  men  among  its 
writers.  I  recall  William  Coleman,  afterwards  founder  and 
editor  of  the  "  New  York  Evening  Post ;  "  James  Elliott, 
poet,  soldier,  lawyer,  and  member  of  Congress ;  and  Rev. 
John  Taylor,  "  the  proverbialist  "  of  Deerfield. 

The  "  Newburyport  Herald  and  County  Gazette  "  was 
also  on  the  Federalist  side,  but  with  great  circumspection. 
Its  original  matter  was  entirely  in  the  form  of  commu- 
nications, the  editor  confining  his  attention  to  the  deaths 
and  marriages,  and  to  collating  the  news  of  the  week. 
Here  the  notorious  Timothy  Dexter  printed  his  absurdities 
and  entertained  a  curious  public,  who  for  some  years  mar- 
velled at  his  shrewdness  while  they  laughed  or  jeered  at 
his  folly. 

The  "  Farmers'  Weekly  Museum,"  of  Walpole,  N.  H., 
was  also  famous  in  its  day.  It  was  the  most  lively  and 
picturesque  of  journals,  and  had  a  very  brilliant  galaxy  of 
contributors.  Besides  Joseph  Dennie,  the  "  Lay  Preach- 
er," there  were  Royal  Tyler,  wit,  poet,  and  chief-justice, 
Thomas  Green  Fessenden,  David  Everett,  Isaac  Story,  and 
several  others,  who  formed  a  merry  group  known  as  the 
"  Walpole  wits." 

Two  or  three  noted  men,  out  of  the  New  England  circle, 
deserve  to  be  mentioned  in  this  category.  William  Cob- 
bett  blazed  for  a  space  in  our  political  and  literary  heavens, 
though  the  light  which  he  brought  there  was  at  times  in- 


33 

fernal.  He  appeared  in  Philadelphia  in  1792,  teaching 
among  the  English  and  French  emigres.  He  was  then  thirty 
years  old.  He  plunged  at  once  into  the  thick  of  the  fight 
against  the  champions  of  the  French  Revolution,  and  the 
atrocities  in  Paris.  His  industry  was  inexhaustible,  his 
intellectual  fertility  miraculous.  Bache's  "  Aurora  "  was 
then  the  chief  organ,  in  this  country,  of  the  Revolution. 
Mr.  Bache  had  been,  almost  from  the  beginning,  a  bitter 
and  venomous  assailant  of  the  administration  of  Wash- 
ington and  of  all  who  upheld  it.  Cobbett  accepted  the 
challenge,  and  pursued  the  assailants  with  a  variety  and 
intensity  of  invective  surpassing  their  own.  He  defended 
the  Administration,  the  Proclamations  of  Neutrality,  the 
Jay  treaty,  and  England  herself  with  a  ferocious  spirit. 
The  Federalists  were  for  a  time  proud  of  their  champion ; 
and  his  writings  had  undoubted  influence,  if  not  in  forming 
opinions,  at  least  in  confirming  and  intensifying  them.  But 
his  political  associates  soon  became  tired  of  him.  Russell, 
as  we  have  seen,  was  no  prude  in  controversy  ;  but  he  had 
no  liking  for  the  brutal  fashion  of  "  Peter  Porcupine's 
Gazette."  l 

It  was  inevitable  that  a  good  cause  should  suffer  in  the 
hands  of  such  an  advocate  ;  and  when  Dr.  Rush  won  the 
libel  suit  against  him,  which  drove  the  libeller  to  New 
York  and  at  last  from  the  country,  very  few  even  among 
the  Federalists  regretted  his  departure.  In  this  connec- 

i  "  Cobbett,"  he  says,  "  was  never  encouraged  and  supported  by  the  Fed  - 
eralists  as  a  solid,  judicious  writer  in  their  cause,  but  was  kept   merely  to 
hunt  Jacobin  foxes,  skunks,  and  serpents.      The  Federalists  found  the  Jaco  - 
bins  had  the  '  Aurora/  '  Argus,'  and  '  Chronicle,  through  which  they  ejected 
mud,  filth,  and  venom,  and  attacked  and  blackened  the  best  characters  the 
world  ever  boasted ;  and  they  perceived  that  these  vermin  were  not  to  be 
operated  on  by  reason  or  decency.    It  was  therefore  thought  necessary  the 
opposite  party  should  keep  and  feed  a  suitable  beast  to  hunt  these  skunks  and 
foxes,  and  the  '  Fretful  Porcupine  '  was  selected  for  this  business." 

5 


34 


tion  it  is  only  just  to  say  that  the  bad  manners  of  the  press 
of  that  time  were  not  peculiar  to  this  country.  Scurrility 
was  the  fashion  of  the  time.  The  French  press  during  and 
long  after  the  Reign  of  Terror  was  atrocious.  Brissot, 
Marat,  Danton,  Robespierre,  Barrere,  Tallien,  had  in  turn 
a  hand  in  making  it  so.  The  English  press  was  better 
only  in  degree.  The  First  Consul  himself  appeared  as  a 
prosecutor  at  Westminster  Hall,  and  libel  suits  on  innu- 
merable pretexts  were  the  order  of  the  day. 

Philip  Freneau  made  a  brief  sensation  as  editor  of  the 
"  National  Gazette."  He  had  been  a  classmate  of  Madison 
at  the  College  of  New  Jersey.  He  went  into  the  "  Ga- 
zette "  in  1791,  and  was  at  the  same  time  emploj^ed  as 
translating  clerk  in  the  State  Department  under  Jefferson, 
who  cordially  assisted  him  in  his  newspaper  enterprise. 
To  the  future  President  Freneau  was  a  most  loyal  and 
devoted  servant.  He  poured  through  the  columns  of  the 
"  Gazette  "  all  the  animosities  which  his  chief  felt,  but  was 
not  willing  to  be  held  responsible  for.  Washington,  Ham- 
ilton, Marshall,  Adams,  and  every  one  who  believed  in 
and  upheld  them  were  in  turn  his  victims.  The  patriots 
who  stood  at  the  cradle  of  the  nation,  the  great  men  whom 
we  were  taught  to  believe  and  whom  we  teach  our  chil- 
dren to  believe  were  without  guile,  the  wise,  patient, 
sagacious  statesmen  who  held  fast  to  the  Constitution  dur- 
ing that  whirlwind  of  party  passion  and  planted  it  upon  a 
rock,  were  the  favorite  objects  of  Freneau's  vituperation. 
The  "  Gazette  "  under  his  management  was  unjust,  un- 
scrupulous, false,  violent,  and  insolent.  It  rivalled  the 
"  Aurora  "  in  the  ugliness  of  its  temper  and  the  extrava- 
gance of  its  rhetoric.  It  is  to  the  lasting  discredit  of  Jef- 
ferson that  he  kept  such  a  libeller  in  his  service,  and  even 
contributed  to  his  scurrilous  journal.  The  late  Mr.  Duyc- 


35 


kinck,  in  his  interesting  memoir  of  Freneau,  shows  an 
amiable  desire  to  give  him  a  better  standing  with  posterity, 
both  as  a  patriot  and  a  man  of  genius,  than  this  portion  of 
his  life  in  my  judgment  entitles  him  to.  I  have  not  been 
so  fortunate  in  my  reading  either  of  his  character  or  his 
writings.  It  is  impossible  to  admire  one  whose  chief  de- 
light was  in  blackening  the  purest  characters  of  his  gener- 
ation ;  and  as  for  his  poetry,  it  is  only  interesting  historically 
as  marking  the  low  level  with  which  the  taste  of  the  time 
was  satisfied. 

Very  different  from  Freneau  and  from  Cobbett  was  Jo- 
seph Dennie,  the  "  American  Addison  "  as  his  friends  were 
fond  of  calling  him.  Life  with  him  was,  at  the  best,  a  play. 
One  cannot  wander  far  in  the  uncleared  pathways  of  our 
early  literature  without  coming  often  into  the  warmth  and 
sunshine  of  his  presence.  He  was  a  native  of  Boston,  and 
a  classmate  of  the  elder  Quincy.  His  early  reputation  was 
made  in  the  "  Farmers'  Museum,"  of  Walpole,  N.  H.,  1795- 
9T,  and  was  continued  in  the  u  Port- Folio,"  at  Philadelphia, 
from  1800-12.  He  was  an  elegant  scholar,  a  graceful  and 
pleasing  writer,  charming  in  conversation,  a  most  winning 
and  delightful  companion.  His  literary  work,  though  uni- 
versally read  and  extravagantly  praised  at  the  time,  proved 
to  be  ephemeral  like  that  of  most  of  his  profession.  His 
most  famous  essays,  printed  under  the  title  of  "  The  Lay 
Preacher,"  touching  with  pleasant  satire  and  amiable, 
though  somewhat  irreverent,  philosophy  on  the  follies  and 
foibles  of  the  time,  mingled  with  not  a  little  serious  counsel 
and  good  criticism,  are  now  as  if  they  had  never  been. 
But  in  their  day  they  were  famous.  The  newspapers  were 
in  hot  rivalry  with  each  other  to  get  the  first  printing  of 
them.  They  were  compared  to  the  writings  of  Addison 
arid  Steele,  and  they  made  the  young  writer  the  centre  of 


36 


the  most  interesting  group  of  wits  and  scholars  then  on 
the  stage.  Though  a  graduate  of  Harvard  College,  he 
never  seemed  in  harmony  with  it.  There  was  some  per- 
sonal humiliation  attending  his  last  exercises  there,  arid 
ever  after  he  hated  the  College  and  despised  the  Faculty. 
He  studied  law  and  began  to  practise  ;  but  one  day  a  client 
came  in  while  he  was  more  agreeably  occupied,  and  from 
that  time  till  he  abandoned  the  profession  he  kept  his  office 
door  locked  on  the  inside.  The  late  Edmund  Quincy,  in 
the  fascinating  biography  of  his  father,  speaks  of  the 
"  Port-Folio  "  as  "  far  superior  to  any  magazine  ever  before 
attempted  in  this  country,"  —  "a  model  of  exact  and  care- 
ful editorship,  and  greatly  beneficial  in  raising  the  standard 
of  literary  taste  in  the  country."  It  was  strongly  Federalist 
in  its  politics,  and  the  most  eminent  Federalist  writers  and 
statesmen  did  not  consider  it  beneath  their  dignity  to  con- 
tribute to  its  pages.  While  Dennie  lived  in  Philadelphia 
he  was  the  soul  of  its  gay,  convivial  society,  and  his  name 
still  lives  in  the  traditions  of  that  hospitable  city.  Tom 
Moore  was  one  of  his  many  guests,  wrote  songs  for  the 
"  Port-Folio,"  and  joined  in  the  nightly  festivities.  In  one 
of  his  poems  relating  to  America  I  recall  the  lines :  — 

"  Yet,  yet  forgive  me,  O  ye  sacred  few 
Whom  late  by  Delaware's  green  banks  I  knew  ! 
Whom,  known  and  loved  through  many  a  social  eve, 
'T  was  bliss  to  live  with,  and  't  was  pain  to  leave  ! 
Not  with  more  joy  the  lonely  exile  scanned 
The  writing  traced  upon  the  desert's  sand, 
Where  his  lone  heart  but  little  hoped  to  find 
One  trace  of  life,  one  stamp  of  human  kind, 
Thau  did  I  hail  the  pure,  th'  enlightened  zeal, 
The  strength  to  reason  and  the  warmth  to  feel, 
The  manly  polish  and  the  illumined  taste, 
Which  —  'mid  the  melancholy,  heartless  waste 
My  foot  has  traversed  —  O  ye  sacred  few  ! 
I  found  by  Delaware's  green  banks  with  you." 


37 


Dennie  died  in  1812,  at  the  early  age  of  forty-four  years.1 
The  "  Port- Folio  "  did  not  long  survive  him. 

Many  other  interesting  names  belong  in  this  list,  but  it 
is  extended  too  far  already.  The  impression  given  of  the 

1  Mr.  Dennie  was  interred  in  the  burying-ground  of  St.  Peter's  Church, 
Philadelphia,  and  a  monumental  column  bearing  the  following  appropriate 
inscription  marks  the  spot :  — 

JOSEPH  DENNIE, 
Born  at  Lexington,2  in  Massachusetts, 

August  30th,  1763, 

Died  at  Philadelphia,  January  7th,  1812. 
Endowed  with  talents,  and  qualified 

By  Education, 

To  adorn  the  Senate,  and  the  Bar, 
But  following  the  impulse  of  a  Genius, 

Formed  for  converse  with  the  Muses, 
He  devoted  his  life  to  the  Literature  of  his  Country. 


As  author  of  the  Lay  Preacher, 

And  as  First  Editor  of  the  Port-Folio 

He  contributed  to  chasten  the  morals,  and  to  refine 

the  taste  of  the  Nation. 

To  an  imagination,  lively,  not  licentious, 

A  wit,  sportive,  not  wanton, 

And  a  heart  without  guile, 
He  united  a  deep  sensibility,  which 

Endeared  him  to  his 
Friends,  and  an  ardent  piety,  which  we  humbly  trust 

Recommended  him  to  his  God; 
Those  friends  have  erected  this  tribute 

To  his  Memory 

To  the  Mercies  of  that  God  is  their  resort 

For  themselves,  and  for  Him. 

MDCCCXIX. 

On  the  north  side  of  the  column  is  inscribed  in  letters  of  gold  the  name 
of  "JOSEPH  DENNIE." 

2  Mr.  Dennie  was  born  in  Boston.  For  a  fuller  narrative  of  this  interesting  writer  sec 
a  sketch  of  Joseph  Dennie,  by  Col.  William  W.  Clapp,  first  printed  some  years  ago  in  the 
"  Saturday  Evening  Gazette,"  and  lately  reprinted  in  a  pamphlet. 


38 


character  and  disinterestedness  of  those  who  have  been 
mentioned  will,  I  fear,  be  less  favorably  regarded  than  they 
deserve.  It  is  necessary  to  remember  that  the  government 
and  the  societ}*  of  their  time  were  experimental.  The  rev- 
erence which  we  are  taught  for  established  institutions  did 
not  exist  among  them.  The  Constitution  and  the  Union 
had  no  historic  claims  to  their  respect  and  affection.  When 
parties  and  administrations  disappointed  them,  extreme  and 
hot-headed  men  on  both  sides  began  to  inquire  then,  even 
more  than  now,  "  What  is  all  this  worth  ?  "  But  among  the 
public  writers  and  journalists  who  have  been  most  vehe- 
mently assailed  for  disloyalty,  —  I  mean  those  on  the  Fed- 
eralist side,  —  the  evidence  to  sustain  the  charge  does  not 
exist.  The  Constitution,  the  Union  of  the  States,  the  ad- 
ministration of  Washington,  the  establishment  of  credit,  the 
planting  of  habits  and  principles  which  grew  into  persistent 
institutions,  and  were  in  process  of  time  adopted  and  pa- 
tronized by  their  most  bitter  enemies,  were  in  great  part 
their  work.  To  charge  them  with  disloyalty  is  to  charge 
them  with  betraying  the  child  of  their  own  hearts.  The 
extreme  Democracy,  carried  away  by  the  malarious  philos- 
ophy of  the  French  Revolution,  fought  them  at  every  step. 
There  is  hardly  one  good  feature  of  the  republican  system 
as  it  has  come  down  to  us,  which  they  did  not  misjudge 
and  resist  to  the  last.  And  when  the  Federalists,  having 
none  of  the  arts  of  winning  popularity,  and  having  perhaps 
too  intense  disgust  for  those  who  stooped  to  gain  it,  saw 
the  people  drifting  away  from  them,  and  knew  under  what 
misleading  influences  it  was  brought  about,  it  would  have 
been  very  strange  if  some  of  their  number  had  not  mis- 
trusted the  excellence  of  the  form  of  government  when 
they  saw  its  spirit  so  wantonly  perverted  from  its  true  pur- 
pose. So,  within  our  own  experience,  a  small  number  of 
able  and  honest,  but  most  mistaken,  men  and  women  have 


39 


rallied  under  the  cry  that  the  "  Constitution  was  a  cove- 
nant with  Death  and  an  agreement  with  Hell."  There 
would  be  much  better  reason  to  arraign  this  whole  section 
of  country  for  disloyalty  on  account  of  these  mistaken  zeal- 
ots, than  there  is  to  charge  with  conspiracy  and  treason 
the  Federalist  party,  or  any  of  the  statesmen  and  writers 
who  had  authority  to  speak  for  it. 

Recent  publications  of  historical  value  have  thrown  a 
great  deal  of  light  on  these  old  controversies.  The  papers 
relating  to  New  England  Federalism,  including  the  por- 
tentous indictment  b}^  John  Quincy  Adams  after  his  retire- 
ment from  the  Presidency,  the  Life  of  Alexander  Hamilton, 
the  Life  and  Letters  of  George  Cabot,  the  Life  of  William 
Plumer,  the  Life  of  Albert  Gallatin,  and  selections  from 
the  Pickering  and  other  manuscripts,  have  revealed  the 
worst  and  the  best  that  can  be  said  about  them.  There  is 
no  evidence  in  the  writings  of  these  statesmen  —  indeed 
there  is  no  direct  charge  anywhere,  with  names  and  dates 
—  to  sustain  the  preposterous  accusation  which  Mr.  Adams 
put  into  form  for  transmission  to  future  generations.  Least 
of  all  is  there  any  evidence  of  such  a  conspiracy  as  he  de- 
scribed to  be  found  in  the  Federalist  journals  of  the  time, 
although  they  reflected  with  remarkable  fidelity  the  chang- 
ing phases  of  policy  and  opinion  among  the  leaders,  while 
their  power  was  steadily  passing  away  from  them.  These 
writers  had  little  of  what  Milton  called  the  "charity  of 
patient  instruction  ;  "  but  they  had  courage,  convictions, 
and  a  loyal  purpose,  which  would  not  permit  them  to  be 
silent  when  they  saw  the  danger-signal  blazing  straight 
before  them. 


OF  CALI 


14  DAY  USE 

RETURN  TO  DESK  FROM  WHICH  BORROWED 

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